Next Time Away novel · Chapter 13 of 24

Chapter 13: Used to It

Soren came at nine that night, in a taxi from town.

I watched from the kitchen window as he paid the driver and stood in my yard with his hands in his coat pockets.

He looked at the new deadbolt before he looked at the door.

Jonas's truck was parked at the end of the drive with its lights off.

I had told him to wait there.

I had told him I would turn on the porch light if I needed him, and he had said, "I'll be out of this truck before the light is warm."

Greta was asleep in her bassinet by the stove.

I opened the door and did not step back to let Soren in.

"Is he out there?" Soren said.

"Yes."

"You called him over to watch me?"

"I called him because I wanted someone here who has never lied to me."

Soren flinched and said nothing.

I let him in.

He sat at my grandmother's kitchen table, in the chair he had sat in every morning for four years, and put both hands flat on the wood.

His eyes went to the bassinet.

"She's so small," he said.

"She's four weeks old. You've held her twice."

"Tove."

"Say what you came to say."

He swallowed.

"Dagny told me you went to Jonas's dock," he said. "She says Elsie drew something. She says you think..."

"Soren. Don't say what I think. Say what happened."

His mouth worked.

His eyes went to the window, and the dark yard, and the truck.

"I can't," he said.

"Then say the other thing. Say why you let me keep him off this land."

He frowned.

"What?"

"Four years ago, my grandmother's caretaker was plowing this drive and mending this roof for nothing. He was fond of her. He was fond of me."

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